Few organisations can get an overview of the own contracts with one click. It manage even small companies often a variety of contractual arrangements. In industries such as insurance companies or banks are contracts from the cornerstone of business model. An overview of essential contract information such as maturities or notice periods is of enormous importance, Contract risks, but also opportunities, to be able to realistically assess.

Often the real challenge lies in establishing a central contract management in the planning, Organization and change management (See also http://www.locatech-it.com/?p=1730 ). Is defined but the process, so is the technical implementation even without their own IT infrastructure with VM365 for Microsoft Office365 possible.

Based on the platform, Microsoft Office365 and the therefore provided SharePoint online-Platform is available with VM365 a professional solution available, the agreements covered not only the entire life cycle of all the company intuitive maps, but provides important evaluations and also very easily and with little effort on individual Requirements can be customized.

In addition to the actual contract documents, VM365 manages all information, they are relevant for a contract. A variety of possible contract attributes (as z.B. Discount conditions at supplier contracts or condition changes in season leases) have already been preconfigured, GGF. important additional information for your organization can be configured very fast. Changes to contracts or contract documents are automatically logged on the spot.

So is a complete contract file with all contract information, all contract documents and that of the entire operation history. In paper-based form the contract file would correspond to a folder in the filing cabinet, on its folder cover important details of the contract are found and contains also notes or the communication between the Contracting Parties in addition to the signed contract.

Contracts are generally subject to a design process, arise in the course of which many design documents and agreements z.B. by Email be taken. A lease, for example, goes through several stages with changes made by the Contracting Parties in the design phase, the other version is created. Then this final version must be filed on one in an editable version, facilitate subsequent substantive tests by text searches, and so that the Treaty can be used as a template for future contracts. On the other hand, must the legal, signed version in a central folder are kept, can be accessed quickly in the, even if it only, to make copies. VM365 supports all of these process steps, All document management features of the Office365 platform SharePoint online are available.

All steps of the life cycle of the contract are supported:

1. Creating different versions of a contract from design to valid final version
2. Coordination between contractors and processing of designs by various persons, Departments, Attorney or service provider
3. Define access rights to contract data (z.B. protected access to employment contracts) and make sure the correct access permissions. Who may see contracts, who can edit?
4. Filing of correspondence or E-mail traffic to the documents
5. Internal sign-off and approval of contracts
6. Headquarters, secure storage of the valid original Treaty signed in, GGF. Digitizing through scanning
7. Search and recovery of contracts
8. Evaluation and storage of the content of the treaties such, that z.B. Time-limits and risks be made comprehensible and controllable
9. Resubmissions and memories of important contractual dates

VM365 supports you in all business processes, in connection with the creation, Processing and analysis of contracts in an Organization Act:

Contracts mountains often untapped potential. VM365 allows you to extensive analyses, to answer questions like:

• In what percentage of cases are contracts filed several times in different departments (Original and copies)?
• How many percent of the persons involved in the Contract management-Process need to access for daily work on contracts of other departments?
• There are departmental / enterprise-wide arrangements for the storage and search of contracts?
• Are the turnaround for standard contracts known within the company?
• How much percent estimate the throughput times for contracts could be shortened in your company.
• Is that Contract management support in your Department with appropriate software?

Any connections between the covered contract information can be produced any evaluations. To determine potential for optimisation and cost savings.

Use VM365 as an active control instrument for contractual risks. For a variety of possible company- and business risks there are contractual arrangements. What happens in the event of a damage? How does the company with delivery from supplier? How are claims regulated by customers? An overall risk management helps in the overall assessment of risks, increases transparency and enables the predictability for example by provisions. Risk management is required not only for corporate governance, but with the risk assessment the basis for communication in the framework of business relations of the partners, Lenders and other stakeholders for the protection of business projects.

Avoid possible risks, which may result in incomplete contract management:

• Non-observance of the statutory provisions
• Unequal information booth / missing actuality
• Difficult to find contracts
• Content-related risks of contracts
• Loss of contracts/contract
• Failure of deadlines, Contract options, etc.
• Poor editing process
• Not always transparent authorisation / approval process
• High throughput times, No contract controlling
• Balance sheet- and revision security

Who may create contracts or see? Who approves treaties. In what versions exist contract documents, and which contract document is the valid original. You use VM365 to manage

• Access rights to contracts according to your organizational structure
• All contract stands in the form of comprehensible document versions

According to Microsoft standards is a fully functional document management system with a simple, configurable user management available.

Contracts may involve many departments of a company and edited by several people. Who has edited what contracts when, When contracts have been approved by who, what actions in the event of termination of the contract must - be often contract activities must be closely regulated and are subject to defined (and may be audited) Business processes. VMP365 you to manage these processes simply by:

• Configure a treaty- and Dokumentversionierung
• How to configure a notification- or approval workflow
• Configuring for contract-related fields, GGF. subject to specific target groups
• Configure more complex SharePoint Workflows

Contracts are often filed under valid legislation and picked only when cancellations or in case of dispute. Often contracts but contain information, that should be easy to find for an extended user group. A manager should keep any pending deadlines for contracts in the eye, Central contracts with special conditions can be interesting for the entire company or subsidiaries, etc. At the same time the accessing of confidential and protected contracts can be restricted. Set using the permission settings of VM365, which contracts for which persons are viewable or editable. Thanks to full-text indexing and allow privileged users to reports, quickly relevant contracts to identify and use. All information from all contracts are users - in the framework of assigned access rights - on push of a button available.

Price agreements with suppliers, Purchase orders and invoices are often managed with ERP systems. Contractual bonuses- or discount schemes are not often used, If a buyer does not have these at a glance or can quickly obtain. With VM365 you can all costs- manage and retrieve price agreements and z.B. also reminder set up, to compete with suppliers in new contract negotiations. If you define price lists according to a uniform scheme in the contract management, are also cross-supplier cost comparisons possible.

VM365 is provided through Microsoft Office365 and is available as a Web application available. These can be opened with any Internet browser, and presents itself in the form of the following or similar:

Use VM365 to manage the following basic information:

• Master contract (can be extended)
• Periods and notice periods
• Other contract deadlines
• Contract costs
• Contract documents
• Tasks
• Dates
• Notifications
• Access rights

The managed contract master data vary depending on the configuration and objective. After installation, the required fields can be easily configured and extended. the collection of master data via a contract mask with multiple tabs. In the management of real estate leases, the mask of a contract might look as follows:

Contractors are subject to a private contractor management, which in turn can get data for example from an Outlook contact list. It is also possible, to manage multiple contact persons per Contracting Party.

Capture a follow-up date for termination of the contract in addition to the terms, so is a constant overview of upcoming Künditungsstichtage available via the termination monitor.

A configurable Benachrichtigungssworkflow lets you automatically provide information by E-Mail, If you want to actively respond to possible changes at termination dates.

Full-text search you get at your fingertips interest contracts. Not only the agreement master data, but also the content of all contract documents are searched automatically, so contracts also for a content search to determine. Search results can be further restricted when large amounts of hits about the master data of the contract.

Analysis on the root of the contract are possible through pre-built or customized reports, for example, after Vertragsverantwortlichen, Follow-up appointments or contract status. These reports are freely configurable by non-technical users in minutes.

Also possible is a further analysis of all contracts for an Excel report.

Contract objects are the objects, Equipment or people/groups, Contracts may relate to the, for example, a passenger in a car lease agreement or a company with a corporate contract.

For contract objects, VM365 supports its own object administration

It is possible through the object management, to manage as many contracts to an object (for example, leases in an apartment building) but a contract to assign multiple objects or (for example, a mobile collection contract for all mobile phones used in the company).

VM365 a comprehensive contract management solution offers advantages:

• A complete overview of all contractual operations with security, to be able to act in good time and proactively.
• Complete overview of the risks resulting from contracts (and also opportunities - negotiations for new contracts).
• Considerable amount of time- and cost savings when you create, Manage, Archiving and retrieval of relevant contract information.
• Immediate deployment of Office365 - not your own technical infrastructure required.

Contact us, We also help set up Office365 and show you our contract management solution in a webcast. A short email to sales@locatech.com or a call under +49 231 9159650 is sufficient!

Contracts in companies strategic importance. In larger organizations, contracts are often managed in different departments or even different companies. Often, it is not transparently obvious, what contracts are valid for which divisions, whether contracts were concluded with the same suppliers at different conditions, planned or actual costs with contracts are connected or when which contracts can be renegotiated or terminated.

Contract management – Keep notice at a glance

In a number of projects we could larger Contract management-Systems on the basis of Microsoft SharePoint introduce and have this experience, the less the technical implementation as rather organisational set up of the project, the Project management and the right, to the success of the project relate to leading how to. This article describes some of these experiences and offers also a small checklist for organizations, deal with the introduction of a central contract management.

The term"Contract"can be very broad in larger organizations, possible specifications ranging from strategic framework contracts for letter of intents to normal rental, Work, Maintenance contracts. But also non-disclosure agreements (Non disclosure agreement) are contracts, that is not only stored, but must be found quickly in the event of a dispute and evaluated. Even orders by suppliers, Performance tickets are contracts or contract elements.

This makes the introduction of a comprehensive and transparent contract management easier, be completed but orders and orders generally by ERP system, While the various treaties in different departments with different tools are managed. And additional important information such as customer data or orders can be in an SAP system, Staff- and organizational information in an Active Directory, Contract lists in Excel files etc..

In addition, access permissions play a special role in contracts. For each type of contract, there is usually a defined user group, create the contracts, Edit, or see a. Also confidential contracts may be subject to special rules of confidentiality.

Finally, privacy considerations are introduced a contract management, and also, the Works Council must be included with, but for many contracts, personal data stored and processed.

It all depends on the Organization

A centralized contract management can therefore not be introduced "just". For an introduction to successful, are the following organisational prerequisites essential:

• A clear Mandate of the management, that a central, comprehensive contract management will be introduced. Such an introduction is a change management project, and without a clear commitment of the management team, an implementation can not succeed, because working methods must be changed and resistance and delay trends are expected in departments.
• A project team equipped with this mandate, combines the organizational and technical skills, with a strong enforcement project manager.
• Use one of Steering Committee of all stakeholders. This should be no roundtable discussion with representatives of all departments, but a small circle of companywide shall Manager, support the introduction and promote.
• Headquarters strategic objective for the entire company. What advantages will a centralized contract management for the entire organization? These objectives must be formulated for all transparent and clearly and regularly communicates, the effort for the implementation of, Implementation and changes to justify. Typical, overarching goals are for example:

• Increase the transparency of signed contracts and thus creating Verhandlungsspielräumen (z.B. with suppliers)
• Terms controlling: Automatic reminders to notice and deadlines
• Savings when you enter, Approve, Search contracts
• Comprehensive reporting
• Avoidance of contract risks

Interests and interested – the “Stakeholder”

A strategic project such as the introduction of contract management, the project always in aware should be, which stakeholder on the project are interested in and also what interests you. In larger organizations, stakeholders are most

• The Executive Board or. the Executive Management
• Project management
• Representatives from one or more departments, stand for the first implementation pilot departments available
• Central IT/system support

Also, the potential impact of the introduction in terms of should already in the design phase to

• Privacy policy
• Brought/Works Council

be evaluated. Because in general personal data are processed and increasing the transparency of the work, such introductions are subject to a participation and need to be evaluated by a data protection officer. By an early evaluation you can avoid later delays or complex adjustments in the actual project.

Who actually wants what?

An assessment is not to be underestimated, which parties pursue what interests. Not always the State of the request is given - all stakeholders pull together-. A good internal communication is important, a teambuilding with all stakeholders and the removal of barriers. So, for example, the IT Department should be clear, that an external service provider not a competitor, but is a temporary team addition. And if employees legacy systems support, that should be replaced, should these be convinced in the run-up to the advantages of new system and support the project.

These considerations apply to all major IT projects in course, but are the introduction of contract management of particular importance, because many departments are affected and because of business-critical documents.

Checklist and phased plan

Prior to the introduction of a process solution for Contract management must the Requirements be defined in a solution. For such purposes, a small checklist is elaborated, It will help you, the necessary preparations to meet. Thus effectively reduce the total cost of an introduction, but a large part of the effort by organisational issues and the often smaller part resulting in the technical implementation.

The following checklist is not exhaustive, but offers an introduction and should jointly answered with your service provider or. be complemented.

1. Target rules

What are the key objectives for the contract management? We would these prioritize goals? Examples as shown above:

• Increase the transparency of signed contracts and thus creating Verhandlungsspielräumen (z.B. with suppliers)
• Terms controlling: Automatic reminders to notice and deadlines
• Savings when you enter, Approve, Search contracts
• Comprehensive reporting
• Avoidance of contract risks

2. Initial situation analysis

The departments concerned should be questioned in detail about, how you manage your contracts so far and what attributes / They need information on the contracts in the future, to find, for example, documents. The requirements of each Department are usually individually and are then configured in the form of various types of contracts in the contract management.

• What kinds of contracts or. to be managed with the software?
• There are how many contracts per contract type (Order of magnitude)?
• In what state (Paper, Scan)?
• What additional information (Cover letter, Communication) have been managed so far, together with the treaties and. are to be managed in the future?
• How did times so far, Notice periods etc. managed?
• Who are the parties? Contact lists already exist in electronic form?
• There are (each contract type) a currently carried out contract management, where the essential characteristics of the contract such as z.B. Deadlines, Conditions, Validity, etc. be kept up-to-date? In what form is the management (Excel, ERP-system...)
• For what types of departments/contracts to the software in the first implementation be implemented?

The identified types of contract, What additional information (Meta-information) to be maintained for each contract type? Examples of possible fields below.

3. Collect and consolidate the requirements

Focus in the specification on one or two pilot departments. Even though the requirements/needs of all departments should be included, is the restriction on a pilot Department very useful, to shorten a long - perhaps never-ending - request discussion. A structuring of the requirements might look as follows:

Contract storage

What types or classes of documents to be managed? Examples include contract designs, signed original, Price lists, Correspondence, Resignation letter, Confirmation cancellation, Documents/presentations of the contractual partner, etc.

Contract attributes

The following list is an example and includes the most common attributes (our project experience)

• Contract title
• Contract dealer
• Contractor/contractor
• Contract status (What is the status can a contract have (GGF. differentiated by type of contract)? Example: Active, Dormant, Expired, Announced, Resubmission, Inactive, Interrupted)
• Contract type (Lease, Lease agreement...)
• associated Department/Division
• Contract number (Number ranges of created departments, The contract partner number)
• Contract key/category
• Contract responsible persons
• Scopes for contract (for example geographical scopes for globally operating companies)
• Associated/related contracts (Framework contracts, overarching contract regulations, separately managed systems, z.B. Performance tickets)
• Contract dates (Completion date, Term of contract, Cancellation deadlines, Extension options, Resubmissions)
• Undersigned persons/Unterschrifstdatum
• Place of storage of the original paper contract
• Language of the contract
• Contract costs (Once/periodic/variable)
• Contract currency
• Terms of payment

Depending on the constellation, a lot more contract attributes may be desired/useful, and ggf. certain information in third-party systems such as z.B. an ERP system manages. Important here is a balance and balance between

• the desire, to be able to perform later comprehensively as possible all types of evaluations
• the effort in capturing contracts

Only attributes are basically fully evaluable, that must be entered as a mandatory. One often sensible approach is, to prescribe minimum required fields for creating a contract, to enable a quick first version, only when the contractual status more fields specific to provide, for example, if a legal agreement will be filed.

Document management

• Editing and automatic versioning possible/desirable?
• Approval workflow?
• Import/export documents?

Compliance requirements

• History/versioning of all changes to contracts and contract attributes?
• Given revision security? What is revision security defined in your organization?

Privileges and responsibilities

• What people have which roles in relation to the contract (Person in charge, Accounting clerk, Supervisors, legal contact).
• For who is a contract relevant/valid?May these people see the contracts or even edit? Only insight in the contract attributes (Evaluations) or in the documents themselves

Reporting

• What types of evaluations are needed?
• Simple create/expand reports

Search/retrieval of contracts

• Full-text search
• Search for categories/attributes or. Combinations
• Entry pages
• To do lists

Notifications

Automatic notifications of specific changes, z.B.

• early expiration of notice
• Changes made by others

Multilingualism

Is there a central corporate language, or must the system be multilingual? What languages should be supported?

Interfaces

What third-party systems to provide data? For which third-party systems must data be provided. Examples:

• Can person master data from an SAP system or from a directory service (Active Directory) come
• Contractual partner master data can come from an ERP system
• Contract information must be provided if necessary. other systems can be deployed
• If other contract management systems in use and should be replaced immediately, is a contract information synchronization to ensure
• Contract files need for third parties (z.B. a law firm) provided/exported can be

Data migration

The data to be migrated must be planned carefully in the course of separation from other contract management systems. This is usually a small subproject.

4. Implementation timetable

The creation and adoption of an implementation roadmap (called also roadmap) is of crucial importance. This plan should take into account organisational and technological aspects

• Request catalog
• Internal conception of the project
• Tendering/evaluation product manufacturer/service provider
• Selection process and budgeting
• GGF. Pilot project with provider(n)
• Development of fine concept / Implementation specification together with supplier/service provider

Following should be started with the classic implementation. In this first phase, "Selling" the benefits of a central is contract management inside at least as much as the choice of the "right" partner and service provider.

These hurdles are taken and sit a stakeholder, Project team and external partners really in a boat with a common goal, then, nothing in the way of a successful launch.

Summary

Unfortunately, many implementation projects are still longer than planned take, be more expensive or very scheitern. Ultimately, there is no guarantee recipe for the successful introduction of contract management, but experience shows, that you repeatedly underestimated the organizational hurdles. The organizational conditions are good and the service provider is competent and both technically as well versed on organizational, easily manage these projects. Are not given the organisational requirements, failure even the best project team.

—————— Update 08/2012 ———–

A current, You will find here further articles about the organizational challenges in establishing a contract management:

http://www.locatech-it.com/technologien-plattformen/sharepoint/einfuhrung-eines-zentralen-vertragsmanagements-in-unternehmen-leitfaden-und-checkliste/

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Prior to the introduction of a process solution such as a system for the Contract management the existing processes have illuminated and the Requirements be defined in a solution. For such purposes we have developed a checklist, It will help you, the necessary preparations to meet. Thus effectively reduce the total cost of an introduction, but a large part of the effort by organisational issues and the often smaller part resulting in the technical implementation.

The following checklist is not exhaustive, but it provides a good overview and should together answered with your service provider or. be complemented. Subsequently, a solution - such as z.B can then. the on ECSpand based SharePoint Contract management -be implemented very cost effective.

1. Target rules

What are the key objectives for the contract management? We would these prioritize goals? Examples:

• Better deadline, automatic notifications
• Analysis/reporting of contract data
• Compliance
• Faster retrieval

2. Initial situation analysis

The departments concerned should in detail about interviewed, how you manage your contracts so far and what continue reading…

Only a few companies are now able, with one click a current overview of the treaties concluded by you to provide, to realistically a resulting risks - but also opportunities-, and whether it's only miss the agreed period of notice. Even small companies already manage a variety of contractual arrangements, in industries such as insurance companies or banks are contracts from the cornerstone of business model.

A wide variety of types of contracts may apply:

• Leasing contracts
• Contracts of employment
• Mobile phone contracts
• Supplier contracts
• Customer contracts
• Maintenance contracts
• Rental agreements
• License agreements
• Non-disclosure agreements and much more.

continue reading…

We even have a small selection of interesting articles on the subject Enterprise 2.0 for companies put together. All deal with the Microsoft SharePoint-Technology, with straightforward business processes simplifies and automates be can.

• Automate management processes with Microsoft SharePoint
• Professional contract management with Microsoft SharePoint
• Effective complaint management with Microsoft SharePoint
• SharePoint 2010 – Operating system 2.0 for your company?
• companies 2.0 – Wiki, Blog and Twitter for your business

We have our Blog entry on the subject of contract management with SharePoint revised and published as a printable PDF Professional article. When you consider the electronic management of your contracts and agreements, can you download here free of charge the article:

Download professional article

Not everyone is known, that one is a large part of the SharePoint functionality already with the so-called SharePoint Services (AB 2010 SharePoint Foundation) can use, which can be used in the context of an existing Windows Server license without additional license costs. So services can be published to example Web sites with SharePoint, as long as they only anonymous access. Details under http://www.mcseboard.de/microsoft-lizenzen-50/windows-sharepoint-services-anonymer-benutzung-84136.html.
continue reading…